Infrastructure spending is a big deal ideologically in Montana right now.

So what’s in the bill that they don’t want you to know about? I mean, infrastructure sounds great…but is it really the kind of infrastructure that’s going to help you? And what if I told you that on top of it, much of the money is being spent to benefit the fossil fuel industry? Let’s take a look at some of what the $150 million SB 416 funds:

$3.5 million to the coal board;

$30 million to the natural resource exploration group;

$7.6 million for First Step – Mental Health;

$18.4 million for MSU Romney Hall;

$25 million for the Montana Heritage Center;

$10 million for UM Clapp Center Renovations.

The list goes on, and there’s some good stuff, like updating the electrical systems at Lewis & Clark Caverns to the tune of $1.7 million, and of course that asbestos cleanup at UM. But do we need $1.6 million for Reeder’s Alley, or that damn historical society building that they’ve been trying to get since K. Ross Toole’s day? Not at the price of bonds.

This is where Democrats go off the rail a bit, and you can see where the banks have hoodwinked them. We do not need to borrow when we have cash!

Already we got the bill down to $150 million. I bet Bullock would have been able to keep some of those other pet projects if he wouldn’t have been so hardheaded when it came to borrowing. But remember, the bankers made the arrangement with him that if he gave them decades worth of interest payments, they’d ensure he’d be governor for four more years. That’s why even if he wanted to, he couldn’t change course and come out tomorrow, saying something like, ‘hey, let’s shave $50 million of that bonding away and go with cash, how ‘bout that, huh?’ Nope, he couldn’t do that – the bankers have their hooks in him…and therefore us, as Democrats.

Why the Democrats have forgotten that bankers destroyed this country in 2008 is beyond me. I guess it’s because they didn’t leave the country for five years while the meltdown took place, like I did. It gives you a different perspective, as does getting away from the propaganda machines.

Democrats have a problem with this, and it’s unfortunate. Let’s not even get into how the bankers destroyed us in 1928 and how it took Democrats to get us out of that mess, or how Democrats sold us down the road after that. Yes, if Truman just would have taken the reins back from the financial royalty of this country, we might not be in the mess we’re in today. Of course, Roosevelt should have never given the corporations so much power during WWII, but perhaps the war couldn’t have been won otherwise. But we digress. Infrastructure spending is good for Montana and it’s good for America, but you know what’s bad for both? Debt.

Why do we have this love affair with debt in this country? While the Billings Gazette and other newspapers across the state will be quick to lay blame, none will point out that we have cash in the bank that we can use for infrastructure, none will ask the simplest question of all – why do we borrow when we don’t have to?

It’s common sense, the kind that your grandma would have kicked you in the head for doing without. But we do without common sense today, and that’s why it’s important to separate the responsible Democrats of this state and this country, the kind that believe debt is killing us, and the corporate Democrats, the kind that cozy up to Wall Street and believe they’ll have a spot on the lifeboat when the ship goes down and the rich are fleeing.

They won’t.

The problem is that no one will have a spot on that lifeboat, and instead of scurrying for it, we need to be saving the ship, and to hell with the bankers and fat cats while we’re at it. If they’ve got so much money and it’s so good, what do they need America for anyways? Leave us be, head off to the clouds in your spaceships, your deep ocean cities or massive underground bunkers. Leave us alone! So remember, we have two types of Democrats – the responsible kind that bear a lot of resemblance to the Tea Party freaks in their economic common sense, and the corporate types that think enslaving your family to poverty wages and endless credit card bills is the way to go. It’s not, and that’s why we never should have gone so far down this bonding road. But we did, and now we’re paying the price. But remember, that price doesn’t affect me…my job isn’t dependent upon the shaky, fossil-fuel dependent Montana economy. I live in the 21st-centry and make my money in the new economy. If you don’t know what that looks like, it’s fine – you probably also don’t understand time management or how to make a dollar from nothing. Lots of people in the Montana legislature don’t either, and we’ll get to watch them clown around again with your money, and the long-term debt obligations of your children, again bright and early tomorrow morning. I don’t expect to see anything different from what we saw today, expect if Bullock wants to budge and infuse some common sense into Montana policy. Don’t borrow when you don’t have to…at least not so much! This mess could be cleaned up real quick, and we have the cash in the bank to prove it. But that’s called leadership, and today we’re sorely lacking in that department.

Leave a Reply.

Montana Blogby Greg Strandberg

This Montana history blog is working its way up through time.It began in March 2013 with the early geology of Montana and continues on toward recent Montana history. Currently we're edging up into the 1990s.